


Sensitive Cowboys (The Fragile Bodies Remix)

by Amatia (orphan_account)



Category: American Actor RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-27
Updated: 2010-09-27
Packaged: 2017-10-12 06:14:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/121718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Amatia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a time, the DamonAffleck comm had a remix challenge. (In which Matt is a psychic CSI, and Ben's the county Sheriff.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sensitive Cowboys (The Fragile Bodies Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Sensitive Cowboys](https://archiveofourown.org/works/208) by [cupidsbow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cupidsbow/pseuds/cupidsbow). 



They're the first ones to the scene. Matt barely gets the door of the squad open before the smell of gas slams into him, knocking out all his senses for a second. Distantly he hears Summer ask if he's all right and Matt blows air hard out of his nose to clear his head. "I'm fine," he tells her, "and the smell will not be the worst thing here, trust me." He knows she can't see the cloud of gas like he can, can't feel the souls still near in the air, one of them so small. "We might want to get a fire crew up here. Just in case it goes."

"Right."

He grabs his kit and gets the rest of the way out of the SUV as Summer reaches for the radio mic. There's a flash of green in his mind as he makes his way carefully down to the wreck, pulling on a fresh pair of latex gloves as he goes. _Money. Like the last one?_

"Ben's on his way," Summer calls from behind him. She's following his path. There's glass everywhere, little sparkling stars on the dark pavement and in the grass. The sun is only starting to come up.

He can feel the headache creeping in. It's going to be a long day.

*

Eight hours earlier, they'd been sprawled out on the couch, Matt running his fingers lightly up and down Ben's arm as they watched a bad movie on pay-per-view. "You're not concentrating," he whispered. "I can still read you."

"I can't do two things at once," Ben chuckled.

Matt grinned. "You don't want to be doing either of those things, I can tell."

"The perils of having a psychic for a boyfriend," Ben moaned, and tipped his head back for a kiss.

Matt obliged him for a moment before pulling away, dizzy with all the things he'd been reading through Ben's skin. "I'm serious, you need to shield if we're going to do this."

"Is it that bad?"

"You know what one of my main motivators for being a crime scene investigator was?" Matt asked. Ben shook his head. "I can wear gloves all the time and no one looks at me funny. I couldn't do that on patrol. It's not good _or_ bad, it's just overwhelming. It's even more overwhelming when it's someone I _want_ to touch."

"You want to touch me?" Ben whispered, and Matt shivered at the naked desire on his face.

"So much. Now concentrate."

*

 _Murder. Murder. Murder._ The word always runs around in his head with each homicide, taunting him, every single one. A sedan wedged against a splintered tree at the bottom of a gully with skid marks all the way down. It doesn't look like a murder - it looks like the blonde missed the curve in the dark and went over the edge. It's happened before on this stretch of road. But Matt knows better. "The water bottle," he murmurs to Summer. "Let's get it to Casey."

She bags and tags, and carries it up the hill to send with a uniform to the lab along with the other half a box of evidence. He can tell she's thankful to get away from the car for a minute, away from the lifeless baby still strapped into the car seat in the back. While she's gone, Matt peels back part of his glove and touches the heel of his hand to the blonde's undamaged wrist. _Murder. Money, oh god they want the money, they drugged me, not my baby -._ But that's all he can get, and even that is dim and blurry. No glimpse of what happened before the car went off the road. No flash of any other vehicle that might have been out here with them.

Summer's making her way back down the slope. Matt readjusts his glove. Her face is pale as she kneels down next to him and hands him a pair of tweezers. "You okay?" he asks. "Joaquin was looking like he'd lose his lunch for a while there."

"I'll be fine," she says crisply, and holds the evidence bag for him to drop the glass fragments into as he lifts them from around the woman. A shadow falls over them and they look up. Ben's standing there. His sheriff's hat is the perfect rakish angle on his head and seeing it always makes Matt feel better. "Hey, Boss," Summer says to him.

Matt adds, "You got here fast."

"I had a feeling you'd be calling," Ben replies, his eyes sweeping over the car. "What's the bad news?"

*

Hunting Falls was a small town and that was what Matt liked about it. He'd never done well in big cities - Boston had been as big as he could handle, and he'd only lasted one night in New York City. Not to mention Boston and NYC didn't have tall, dark and handsome county sheriffs who understood right away that Matt was different - _I process information differently than most people,_ he'd said, after the first case he'd solved using his abilities had reached the point where he couldn't explain away how he'd known certain details.

Ben had sat down next to him at the long desk where Matt was swabbing a shirt for blood evidence to send to the state's crime lab, his eyes kind and understanding. _Explain it to me,_ he'd pressed.

 _I can see some of the things the victim saw before they died if I touch them. I can read what people are feeling when I touch them._ Matt had let his eyes drift to Ben's hands, purposefully in his lap and not on the table with the evidence. _My last supervisor didn't handle it well when she found out,_ he'd said, in the most diplomatic tone he could manage.

 _She was afraid of you._

Matt shrugged. _Most people don't believe in the paranormal._

Ben had looked at him for a long moment. _I do,_ he said, and held out his hand.

*

Ben pulls him away from the wreck to where the air is a little more breathable, asking about the headache. "Fucking killer," Matt replies. His neck is tense, too, and he rolls his head to try and ease some of the stiffness. "But worth it."

"That's what you always say," Ben says, and he's right. They'd been working like this long enough for Ben to know all the lies Matt tells on scenes. "But here's a novel idea: we could find out the autopsy results _first_ and then try other methods _second_."

Part of him wants to laugh but he's bordering on sensory overload already. "Where's the fun in that? Besides, if we waited for the autopsy results, I wouldn't have treated this as a murder scene, and we would have lost a whole heap of evidence."

"Dammit," Ben swears, and his hand tightens on Matt's arm for a moment before he suddenly lets go, like he's realized how close Matt is to giving in to the brightness creeping into the edge of his vision, like he's figuring out any more sensation might push him over the edge. _If there's any touch I could stand right now,_ Matt thinks, _it would be yours._

But Ben, ever careful with him, sticks his hands in his pockets and it looks absurd with all the equipment on his duty belt. "Same M.O. as the other one?" he asks.

"Yep," Matt says, and he takes a step forward to regain the ground that Ben had put between them. "We've definitely got a serial."

*

It's dark again when Matt leaves the station, yawning into the night and rubbing his neck with the hand not holding a stack of file folders. He's standing next to his car digging in his pocket for the keys when Ben comes up next to him. "Hey."

"Hey."

"You coming over?"

"I should really review the crime scene photos again," Matt hedges.

Ben rolls his eyes. Softly, he says, "You should get a decent night's sleep, and that means not looking at victim pictures until you pass out on your kitchen table."

"What do you mean? That's good times." Matt gives him a smile he knows is tired and unconvincing. "Are you safe to go home?"

"Joaquin, despite the fact that he can't look directly at a dead body, is an excellent third shift supervisor," Ben says wryly. "Give him a few more years and he'll be running against me in the election." He touches Matt's wrist briefly. "Come on, Matty; let's get some sleep, at least until they wake us up with the next one."


End file.
